Conference vmsnet::hunting$note:hunting

1077.0. "Colo. Land use...." by CSC32::SCHIMPF () Tue Nov 12 1991 01:31

    This info was "borrowed" from the Rocky Mountain News;  Without written
    permission.  Dated, November 11, 1991/ page 10.
    
    
    A public lands access group, fearing that agriculture and mining
    interests will maintain access control of 2.9 million acres of Colorado
    school lands, is considering take the battle straight to the
    legislature.
    
    At stake are 2,400 plots, ranging from 40 to 70,000 acres, which
    recreation and hunting groups want opened to the public, while ranchers
    and miners who lease them are fighting to control who gets in.
    
    Dave Foss, president of littleton-based Public Lands Access Coalition,
    said he believes recomendations made by a 10-member task force are so
    stacked against open access that his group might as well start priming
    the legislative pump now, rather than waiting for a State Land Board
    decision in June 1992.
    
    ************    Two Paragraphs of "Natha"   **********
    
    The lands, spread over most of the state, were deeded by the federal
    government to Colorado when it became a state in 1876, to be leased
    to mining and agricultural interests in order to generate funding for
    public schools.
    
    Since the beginning, the Land Board left the question of access to the
    lessees.  But in the past 20 years, more and more lease-holders have 
    been accused of treating the land as private property, charging 
    recreation-users to "trespass" on them.
    
    Hoping to find a compromise, the state land commissioners formed the
    task force composed of five members with ties to ranching or farming;
    four representing hunting or outdoor recreation; and one representing
    the state Board of Education.
    
    Last week, the tack force relesed it recommendations.   They include:
    
       1) Maintaining the status quo with lessees controlling access.
    
       2) Granting rights-of-way across trust lands that block access to 
          other public lands.
    
       3) Lessee-controlled access with incentives to allow access.
       
       4) Auctioning all leases to the highiest bidder.
    
       5) Opending all legally accessible trust lands to public use.
    
       6) State-controlled access which opens all lands to public use but
          requires active management by the D.O.W and Parks and Outdoor
          recreation departments.
    
       7) Opening selected parcels based on inventory.
    
       8) Opening trust lands for general recreation with specific
          strategies for big-game hunting.
    
    Those pushing for open access respond that ranchers and farmers have
    simply annexed public lands to their own private holdings.
    
    Public comment on the alternatives willbe open unitl Dec. 31, and
    copies fo the report are available for $3.00 at the Land Board,  1313
    Sherman St., Room 620, Denver 80203.
    
    
    This should be REAL interesting as to the outcome;  Any comments?
    
    
    Jeff